NES Annoying screen space

[rebeldog0085]

I have this annoying space on the left side of my screen in my NES system. It seems to be there mainly on Mario 3 but I have also noticed it on a couple of other games. It seems to change colors with the backround and it seems to be in the TV unless both of my nintendos suffer from the same problem. Any idea's on what could be causing this? I have a 27 inch flat screen tv if that helps. Thanks in advance

[BocoDragon]

I think it's just normal for NES, man. I remember dealing with all kinds of screen bars and graphical garbage throughout the NES era. I think back then most TVs wouldn't have displayed the full screen as well as TVs of today do... it might have been cropped off by 80s TVs.

I will check my mario 3 to see if I have the same thing (I have a 27 inch flatscreen too :) )

EDIT: Yes, the "bar" is there. These are just the things we had to deal with back in the day.... Picture quality didn't become such a hot topic until well into the 16-bit era.

[eightbitonline]

This happens with every copy of SMB3 i have as well.

[Kitsune Sniper]

http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j238/foxhack/DP/smb3cplors.png

It's normal.

[XxHennersXx]

I don't remember this as a kid, so when I loaded up the rom a few years back i thought it was a rom until I got another copy of SMB3.

I guess it's normal...

My theory is that my TV just cropped it off.

[Superman]

I don't remember that happening with my 27 inch tv, but after viewing Kitsune's screenshot, it looks familiar.

I'll have to try it out on my tv to be sure.

[cyberfluxor]

It's normal. The reason why people recall playing it without the line was because it was "fixed" in the SNES version for All-Stars.

[XxHennersXx]

It's normal. The reason why people recall playing it without the line was because it was "fixed" in the SNES version for All-Stars.

...I never owned an SNES until AFTER I repurchased an NES and SMB3.

[cyberfluxor]

...I never owned an SNES until AFTER I repurchased an NES and SMB3.

I just simply plopped my SMB3 into the NES and All-Stars into the SNES and turned each on. I have little knowledge on older TV sets as to how it'd trunk the sides off as such, I'd expect some "out of bounds" type error on the output. Maybe it's the connectors that do it, considering I use RF.

[Octane06]

If I remember correctly, Crystalis also had the bar. Maybe we should make a list of what games had this oddity...or not.

[XxHennersXx]

I just simply plopped my SMB3 into the NES and All-Stars into the SNES and turned each on. I have little knowledge on older TV sets as to how it'd trunk the sides off as such, I'd expect some "out of bounds" type error on the output. Maybe it's the connectors that do it, considering I use RF.

It's there with RF and with composite. I think we just might have never noticed this as kids

[DefaultGen]

.....

[MarioMania]

the Famicom version of SMB3 has it also

[goemon]

I think it has something to do with scrolling and how the screen is drawn. I'm not a programmer or anything so don't take that as gospel, but I recall reading that somewhere.

[XxHennersXx]

Kirby Adventure had it too, I wonder if it's like that on VC?

the rom is like that so i'm assuming so.

[dgdgagdae]

How funny. I noticed this on my SMB3 ROM quite awhile ago and thought it was just an emulation glitch. Because I certainly didn't remember it looking like that when I was younger. And sure enough, got a copy for my NES a few weeks ago, and there it was!

[starfox316]

I have a bunch of NES games that try and pull that crap on me, man! I just rough 'em up a little bit and get 'em back in line though.

Kirby's adventure, tiny toon adventures (which to me seems like one giant glitch that sometimes resembles a decent platformer) and smb3 are just a few. It's just something that the NES likes to do, like blinking.

[ccovell]

It's not an oddity; it's completely normal. It's just that you're used to black being beyond the borders of the game screen, rather than sky blue, which several platformers use.

[InsaneDavid]

Geez people, it's normal, it's how the NES displays certain stuff. You were never meant to see it anyway, it's garbage beyond the screen boundary.

[veronica_marsfan]

I have a 27 inch flat screen tv if that helps.

Change to a CRT and you won't see it, because the bar will be off the edge of the tube (overscan). NES was designed for CRTs.

Some Atari games like Space Invaders have visible scanlines on the left side of the screen. Again on a CRT this would not be visible 'cause of the overscan.

[XxHennersXx]

Change to a CRT and you won't see it, because the bar will be off the edge of the tube (overscan). NES was designed for CRTs.

Some Atari games like Space Invaders have visible scanlines on the left side of the screen. Again on a CRT this would not be visible 'cause of the overscan.

WRONG.

I still see it on all my CRT TV's. I play my NES on a 22 inch CRT and a 32 inch CRT and it's still there.

[rbudrick]

The Atari 2600 had them, but it was only partially covered by the screen border. It was an artifact of the programming methods for sure (along with those little lines that appeared in just about every game. It was necessaey to have it there. Some later game programmers learned how to get rid of it.

I forget what the explanation was, but I think it had something to do with synch or rewriting the screen or something.

-Rob

[BocoDragon]

WRONG.

I still see it on all my CRT TV's. I play my NES on a 22 inch CRT and a 32 inch CRT and it's still there.

CRT clearly isn't the difference. My 27 inch flatscreen is a CRT and the bar is there.... BUT, I bet older TVs did not display as much of the viewing area, at least consistently across all models of TV.

[mario2butts]

Some TVs overscan more than others, it just depends on the model. But as a general rule, older tube TVs tend to overscan more than the newer display technologies like LCD, which is probably why you see it now but don't remember it from back in the day. Many NES and Genesis games have garbage around the screen that would've been invisible on typical TVs of the 80's and early 90's that had a large amount of overscan.

[veronica_marsfan]

CRT clearly isn't the difference. My 27 inch flatscreen is a CRT

How can you have a flatscreen CRT? That's not physically possible is it? Don't you need a deep cabinet to hold the bulky tube? (puzzled look)

And yeah older 1970s/80s sets tended to show only 80% of the actual screen. The other 20% was not visible.

[Gentlegamer]

How can you have a flatscreen CRT?The surface of the screen isn't curved.

[BocoDragon]

How can you have a flatscreen CRT? That's not physically possible is it? Don't you need a deep cabinet to hold the bulky tube? (puzzled look)

Remember Sony Wega CRTs?

You're thinking of Plasmas and LCDs with the word "flatscreen", but that's not what it means. It means a flat CRT screen as opposed to a bubble CRT screen (remember, bubble CRTs were all we had until the late 90s)

[veronica_marsfan]

Yes I was thinking of "flatpanel" TVs. Confusing terminology.